Vonn explained to the workshop crew, "Yeah, he has the strange memories too. So expect to see him touring the place soon. Hey, Urika, what do you know about life for Centaurs under the Scaled Nation?"

The master Smith frowned. "Likely bad. They call my kind 'Citizens' there. No one else. If he left there, I can see why."

Vonn and Tazo avoided getting in the others' way, and took over another table and blackboard. "What do you want to work on today, sis? Assuming we're not pulled into a rush order for weapons."

"I have an idea, but like I said, we really ought to start on another wind gun. If nothing else it'll make us look useful when the Baron stops by."

So they went to work. The wind gun involved "lock, stock, and barrel". The metal tube was simple, just a smoothbore design so far. So was the wooden stock, made from the local version of the cypress tree. But the mechanical bits were tricky for a non-Engineer. The device needed a pair of valves, meant to blow air into the barrel and propel a bullet. Also, for propellant it needed a pressurized air tank, fed by a wind-attuned crystal and storing enough air to keep the weapon ready for around twenty shots. They had several of these tanks lying around because Vonn's power to make them unnaturally sturdy -- "Well of Energy" -- only worked around once a week. He'd been too busy with the airplane project to do more than pile these things up.

He and Tazo did the fiddly work of creating valves. With Vonn's senses as a fourth-level Engineer he could spot little flaws in complex devices, especially his own work, and even Tazo's mere two Engineer levels enhanced her ability to move carefully and precisely to build things. The trouble was that since everybody in Vonn's circle was an Engineer or Alchemist, they didn't have a proper Woodworker or generic Craftsman. When Ashfall needed a break he sent her to track down the carver who'd made a few wooden gun stocks for him already.

Vonn said, "Ideally we'd be making a hundred of these valves in a session, not making one gun worth at a time."

They'd finished all but the wood and the assembly work, and Urika had finished a couple of axe blades, so they all paused. Urika said, "In the fall I will finally be able to get another level. That will help." At his age, progress through formal levels was slow.

Vonn nodded. "Other than weapons, what should our plan be?"

Tazo picked up chalk and began drawing. "We've been so focused on the airplane that we were only looking at the short term. I say that instead of hurrying to build another one, we focus on better tools. That'll help with everything. This was one of your ideas, right?"

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She was drawing a milling machine. It was tech from around 1800 on Earth, a machine that spun a cutting tool around to gash bits out of the side of a block, or downward like a drill. It could be used for things like engine cylinders and elaborate metal plates and brackets. It'd mean a distinct step up from what the Smiths were doing over there, whacking hot iron with hammers. Though there'd still be plenty of need for that.

He smiled and said, "Good plan. Let's do a quick garbage prototype to prove the concept. We're going to need good cutting alloys from Grandbridge or someplace else to make it practical." They'd managed to wreck the small amount of hard alloy he'd bought on his last trip.

Tazo's official rank was Mage 3 / Engineer 2, slightly behind her younger brother due to some waffling and class-switching. It was common for people to plateau at around level 5 of any one class, due to the need to do more and more impressive things to make the System grant each promotion. But between their ambition and Vonn's access to otherworld knowledge, they were starting to make alarmingly swift progress.

The Engineers had uncanny skill at the complicated parts, but not much of an edge at making a plain old table to put a machine on. Whenever Vonn tried to make a careful join in some metal, time seemed to slow and his movements felt smooth and precise. Watching Tazo at work was just as amazing, like seeing a surgeon. Using little gears they cut from wood, they soon had a basic whirling rod with a drill bit barely attached, hooked up to a hand crank.

"So then," said Tazo, "we would attach this to one of your rotating belts and from there to an engine or waterwheel."

Vonn nodded. "It needs both force and some speed, like the lathe over there."

Ashfall asked them, "Why go to the trouble, instead of the usual cutting and hammering?"

"This can work metal even while it's cold, and it can make repetitive, precise movements. We could make a hundred identical valves and even set it up so a non-Engineer can do some of the work." He glanced over at a tool rack. "Now, what I'd like to do is make some little swinging hammers for that 'typewriter' I told you about."

Tazo told Ashfall, "Swat him for me."

The Centaur leaned over and gently slapped Vonn upside one ear. "Bad fox."

"Aww."

Ashfall added, "Besides, weren't you going to build that plant-zapping device?"

That was their other, other concern: the well-being of the villages along the south bank of the Little Star River. Most of that area was ruled by Baron Flintarch, who was paranoid enough about potential rebels that he'd ordered his peasants to be Farmers and little else. Even the girl who'd begged Vonn to help her become an official Artist had needed to do so in secret and then move with her family to Baron Bogstep's land. Those guys' messed-up economic situation was tied in with the local Necromancers wanting to rent them zombie labor. The upshot was that Vonn could do a bunch of poor exploited peasants a favor if he produced a few primitive electrical gadgets to process certain crops they wanted to grow.

Vonn set his head down on a workbench and groaned, overloaded.